


Welcome Home

by schrodingers_bee



Series: A Study Into the Complexities of the Irish-English Love Affair [3]
Category: Derry Girls (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, disaster adults
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-12-22
Packaged: 2020-05-12 13:49:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19230382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schrodingers_bee/pseuds/schrodingers_bee
Summary: In the typically fashion that often befell the girls (and, arguably, boy) of Derry, the proposal was a disaster. Truly a shirt storm to rival all others. And given that as teenagers their daily lives often involved minor kidnapping, drugging, theft, brawls, the damage of religious artifacts and the occasional arson, it would be downright ignorant to think that their adult lives ran any smoother.





	1. The Ever-Changing Definition of Normal

In the typically fashion that often befell the girls (and, arguably, boy) of Derry, the proposal was a disaster. Truly a shirt storm to rival all others. And given that as teenagers their daily lives often involved minor kidnapping, drugging, theft, brawls, the damage of religious artifacts and the occasional arson, it would be downright ignorant to think that their adult lives ran any smoother.

 

However, in their 28 years of worldly experience, Erin, James, Michelle, Claire and Orla all considered themselves to be rather wise and were beginning to settle happily in the normality of their daily lives. It was as if they had completely forgotten that normality has a completely different definition in Derry to the rest of the world.

 

#  **Derry normality**

**/dɛri nɔːˈmalɪti/**

**_noun_ **

  1. **the condition of being normal; or at least as normal as you can get when living in the middle of a fecking civil war.**



  


Erin came up with that when she was 15 and, despite it being a fair few years since the Good Friday Agreement, she still stood by her belief that Derry, her Derry, would forever live by its own standard of normal, which now stood, following the disastrous proposal, as;

 

#  **Derry normality**

**/dɛri nɔːˈmalɪti/**

**_noun_ **

  1. **the condition of being normal; or at least as normal as you can get in the most fecking bonkers, bloody —**



—you get the idea. No need to drag dear old Derry into Erin’s frustration.

  


The point is that things didn’t go well.

 

It all started with James’ surprise.

 

Erin had been shuffling through the DVD collection that dominated most of their modest London flat when an envelope fell on her lap. Looking up from her position, curled up on their battered sofa, she saw James gazing down at her, trying to suppress a grin.

 

“What are ye up to?”

 

“Open it and see.” James replied, nodding at the envelope.

 

Tearing it open, Erin gasped.

 

Inside, two ferry tickets to Ireland and a note in James’ crawled handwriting;

 

_Fancy a reunion? x_

 

Erin gasped,

 

“Everyone?”

 

“Everyone.” He smiled.

 

Erin leapt into a hug, arms and legs wrapped around James, and laughed. A laugh of excitement and surprise but also, unknown to James, great relief.

 

Erin was in desperate need of some advice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoy this, rather brief, chapter! I've been wanting to write a third installment for a little while now, so I just hope there are still people interested in reading it!


	2. Seriously?!

When James finally got out of the car, he could have sworn he heard his bones creak. Judging by Erin’s groan, the feeling was mutual.

 

“Claire and Julie are still a few hours away,” Erin relayed, scrolling through her messages, “Orla’s flight should land soon and Michelle--“

 

James looked over and saw Erin’s face fall.

 

Then smile softly.

 

Then fall again.

 

“What is it?”

 

“Huh.”

 

“Are you okay, love?”

 

“Yeah, yeah,” Erin replied, shaking off the weight on her chest for the time being, “Michelle said come over anytime.”

 

James wasn’t sure what Michelle could have said to make Erin so conflicted but shook it off. He trusted Erin more than anyone and knew she would tell him in her own time. If it was serious.

 

“Erin!” A familiar voice squealed, as a blur of blond hair threw herself at her sister.

 

“Hello Anna!” Erin laughed, lifting her off the ground.

 

“Oo, I’ve got so much to tell you, like Grandpa Joe nearly shot Uncle Colm—“

 

“— woah, woah steady on there!” Erin grinned, watching as James’ face contorted in what can only be described as pure horror at the idea of Joe with a firearm.

 

“Why don’t you two catch up on your way to Michelle’s and I’ll bring the stuff in?”

 

“What would I do without ya?” Erin smirked, pecking him on the cheek as Anna murmured “Boke” under her breath.

“It doesn’t bare thinking about.” He retorted, before quickly enquiring about Joe’s current accessibility to weapons, earning him a laugh that did not, by any means, put his mind at rest.

  
  


Sat down with the steaming cup of tea he had yearned for since setting off for Derry in the early hours of the morning, James nervously eyed the bag hanging off Joe’s wheelchair.

 

“I was wondering if I could ask you all something?” Looking round at Gerry, Mary, Joe and Sarah, nervously.

 

“No.” Joe huffed, not feeling any particular grudge against James (aside from the fact that he was dating his oldest granddaughter), just that he hadn’t done anything particularly defiant that day.

 

“Of course, pet.” Mary cooed.

 

James softened, hoping there would at least someone on his side when he finally came out with  _ it. _

 

“Well, I know that you’re usually supposed to just ask the father of the, well,” James cleared his throat, “but I figured in the Quinn-McCool family it would be good to get everyone’s consent.”

 

Mary gasped, catching on to what James was building up to.

 

“I already talked to Anna over the phone, she’s distracting Erin for me, you see. She’s thrilled. I suppose what I’m trying to say is...”

 

He sighed.

 

“May I ask Erin for her hand in marriage?”

 

“Yes!” Mary cried.

 

James smiled, before realising that everyone, beside Mary, was taking out £20 from their wallets.

 

He was getting an awful sense of deja vu about this.

 

“Do you place bets on all of our relationship milestones?”

 

“Not all of them.” Sarah smirked a knowing grin that made James wish for the sweet release of death.

 

“I think I’ll buy one of those iPods with these winnings.”

 

“What are ye gonna do with an iPod, Mary? Ye can barely handle the microwave?”

 

“Nothing can come between Dolly Parton and me, Gerry, not even microwaves.”

 

“What were your bets this time anyway?”

 

Mary hummed in amusement, “Gerry reckoned you would propose before you reached 25, Sarah reckoned it was never going to happen, Da said something about killing you if you didn’t make an honest woman of Erin when we made the bet so we put him down for 21 and I said between 25 and 30.”

 

“You’re very good at these I must say Mary.” James chuckled, seeing some humour in the parallels between the two bets resolved twelve years apart.

 

Suddenly, the front door banged open, “What’s up, motherfuckerssss!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We all knew Michelle was going to make a big entrance :)


	3. Big News

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look who’s back ;)
> 
> If anyone actually cares, that is.

If there was one thing Michelle Mallon was good at, it was making an entrance. That and running a pub.

Who knew?

Of course, unless you were a patron of The Castle, you’d never be able to tell if Michelle was a bartender or a customer. 

“Should you really be drinking your own stock Michelle?” James enquired— sat between Erin and Michelle in one of said pub’s rather suspect booths— following Michelle’s fourth drunken tale of the afternoon. He looked over at Erin for support, to find she was staring at the loos.

“‘Course I can dicko,” Michelle retorted, “it’s my fecking pub, I can do what I like.” 

“I thought Jenny’s family owned—“ 

“Ack, that cow doesn’t own me.”

“No, she owns the pub.”

Before Michelle could respond, the door swung open. Claire and Orla walked in, arm in arm.

“I heard someone was hosting a reunion.” Claire grinned.

In the moments that followed, the squealing that occurred could only be described as deafening. 

~~~

“I’m sorry Julie couldn’t make it.” Erin sighed as Orla rubbed Claire’s back in condolence. 

“No, it’s fine. She had some stuff to catch up on at work.” Claire remarked calmly, strangely unbothered for someone whose immediate response to anything was panic. Erin figured that was a conversation for another day. 

It was pitch black outside and the glow radiating from the pub had attracted a fair share of those looking for a beer and the familiar smell of piss, yet Michelle was turning each one away. 

“Are you sure you’re allowed to be turning customers away on a Saturday night?”

“What are you, the pub police?” Michelle scoffed.

James furrowed his eyebrows, but nonetheless never turned down the opportunity to piss off his cousin, 

“No but your landlord probably is.” 

“Hello girls!” Piped a shrill from the back of the pub. 

Speak of the devil. 

“Jenny,” Erin pointed out, watching Jenny blatantly ignore the CLOSED sign and the locked front door, “hi, um, the pub is closed tonight, you’re aware?” 

“Oh yes,” she chuckled, dripping with smarm, “but, you know, given the wee factor that my name’s on the deed, I thought I’d come and see why Michelle couldn’t open on our busiest night.”

Erin thought back to a simpler time, when punching someone meant detention with a deaf old (if light-fingered) nun, not an assault charge. Looking back, in fact, she felt a great pang of regret that she hadn’t taken the opportunity earlier to give Jenny Joyce the smack she deserved. 

“The pub ain’t gonna collapse.” Michelle slurred. 

“Could’ve fooled me.” She murmured looking the aging pub up and down, before announcing, “I’ve just got to use the loo and I’ll be out of ye hair.” 

“Actually James and I ought to get back.” Erin announced, saying their brief good nights before they headed off into the cold night air.

Michelle huffed in consent, waiting until Erin and James were out of the vicinity before turning to Orla and Claire. 

“Shitshitshitshitshit.” She hissed, running over to the booth. 

“What?” Claire hissed back, looking instinctively at the Ladies’ Room door to see if Jenny was listening in.

“There’s a pregnancy test in the loo bin!” 

“I’m sorry wh—“

“Someone’s pregnant!” 

“I’m sorry but you’re going to have to expand!” 

“Bin, preggers stick, toilet! It ain’t rocket science!” 

“Yes, funnily enough I know how they work!”

“Ugh, you’re useless! I changed the bins before you lot came and we all went to the loo. One of us is pregnant!”

“Who?”

“Well it ain’t you,”

“Fair.” 

“it ain’t me and I mean if it’s Orla I’ll kiss Jenny Joyce’s feet.” 

“Right?”

“It’s Erin!”

“No!” Claire gaped. 

“It’s obvious, she’s been drinking lemonade all night; she was in the loo for ages and she didn’t have the runs because it didn’t pong in there after!” 

“You’re strangely observant when you set your mind to it.”

Michelle smirked knowingly. 

“What do we do?”

“Keep it a secret I guess.”

“What secret?” Orla piped up.

The bathroom door swung open and Jenny strutted out, with far more confidence than you’d expect someone to be coming out of a dismal pub loo with.

“Congratulations.” She grinned, like the cat that got the cream, before marching out of the door, leaving Michelle and Claire in stunned silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so so so sorry I haven’t updated this in ages.
> 
> When I was writing it, it was just before these major exams and then suddenly weeks where I didn’t have the time to write turned into months where I didn’t have the inspiration to write. 
> 
> Anyway I’ve finally picked it up, so for anyone who cares I hope you enjoyed this chapter. 
> 
> Please leave some kudos and/or comments (good or bad) if you can :))


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